


Missing Water

by Scriptserpent



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fist Fights, M/M, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Rowing, Sports, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-11
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-05-20 21:20:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14902223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scriptserpent/pseuds/Scriptserpent
Summary: It was amazing they had been at each others throats just last year. There had honestly been moments Napoleon had seriously considered shoving Illya off the dock. Who would have ever guessed they would end up as roommates the next year? Napoleon would never have wagered on that bet. He didn’t tend to gamble when there was a possibility he’d loose.





	Missing Water

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TempusNoKitsune](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TempusNoKitsune/gifts).



> Missing Water: When a rower misses water due to their oar blade being at an non appropriate depth.
> 
> For TempusNoKitsune, I hope you like it! I decided to lengthen it, so I turned it into a multi chapter story.

These were the mornings Napoleon lived for. He stretched out his arm across his chest, still breathing a little hard from the mile and a half run from the dorms to the boathouse, and gazed out at the river. Mist curled up above the glassy surface, illuminated by the early golden light. The tall grass that sagged over the lip of the banks shivered from the breeze threading through their stalks. In the distance two ducks leisurely floated down river with the current. Napoleon switched arms and glanced down at the grass where his teammates were also stretching. 

Gaby had her earbuds in and wide sunglasses on as she lithely reached forward and grabbed her ankles, folding herself in half with enviable flexibility only a dance major could have. Sitting down on the grass, Napoleon began to stretch out his legs. He winced at the twinge of sore muscle. Gaby smirked, noticing his slight grimace. Napoleon could of commented, but the loud crunch of gravel split apart their peaceful pre workout stretching. He watched their coach travel down the gravel road to the boathouse, parking next to the building to open it up for the day. 

“I told you we got here too early,” Illya muttered from where he was in the grass. He spread out his legs to stretch his hamstrings and Napoleon definitely didn’t watch as the motion rucked up his shirt. 

Gaby unfolded herself, watching their coach walk to the boathouse doors. “I’m going to go help Waverly open,” she replied with a non answer. 

“He’s just grouchy because he was working on his research paper all last night,” Napoleon told their lovely coxswain with a smile. Illya glared at him from the shadows under his stretched out arms. Napoleon continued to smile blithely and ignored him. 

Dusting off any dirt from the grass off her running spandex, Gaby put her sun glasses atop of her head and added, “Would you rather be late and do 2k test?” She didn’t wait for an answer and instead walked away to help. Crunching gravel announced the arrival of other members of their team, who went to stretch in the shade of the trees opposite them. 

“Could be worse,” Napoleon noted to Illya, “I heard one time he had the people that would show up late be the stars of the safety films.” Illya snorted at that and Napoleon’s grin grew. 

It was amazing they had been at each others throats just last year. There had actually been moments he had seriously considered shoving Illya off the dock. Who would have ever guessed they would end up as roommates the next year? Napoleon would never have wagered on that bet. He didn’t tend to bet when there was a possibility he’d loose. 

Illya got up off the grass next to him and arched his back as he stretched his arms over his head. “You should have been in that movie then, maybe you would have payed attention more.” He turned to Napoleon and offered his hand. 

“Oh, what, you’ve never caught a crab before?” Napoleon taunted as he took his hand and stood up. Until last season he had never had caught a crab that bad before. Usually he could stop the oar from crashing into his chest or lean back in time to let it slip over his head and grab the handle. Of course there were other factors to that awful race day. The river had been swollen from rain and from the start the race should have been canceled. Of course, after they had capsized and Illya had nearly drowned, the race was. “Or do you Russians just not do that sort of thing?” Napoleon added, nudging him with his elbow as they walked over to the boathouse. 

Illya scoffed, “Of course we do, we just learn better technique to avoid it.” 

“Well, they tend to teach us to swim,” Napoleon joked, clapping Illya on the shoulder before walking inside to pull their oars. "Helps with the whole being on the water sort of thing." 

“You are never going to let me forget that, are you?” Illya muttered. 

“Nope,” Napoleon cheerfully said as he glanced at the boat assignments hanging up on the clipboard. Nearby in the cool boathouse, the shells of the boats gleamed from the overhead LED lights. Nothing new, then. They were assigned to the same pair as they had been for a while now. Really, he was checking to see where Gaby was assigned. The men’s 8 with Vinciguerra as stroke seat. Oh, he was going to have an earful when he and Gaby had their yoga session later. 

They tasked themselves to getting ready by bringing down the oars to the dock, grabbing their water, and changing their shoes. Napoleon could hear Gaby calling out commands to her lineup to get the boat out to the dock. “Please tell me you really aren’t wearing that,” Napoleon said as he stared down at the crocs clad on Illya’s feet. 

“They’re appropriate,” was all he replied and pulled on a baseball cap to shade his eyes. 

“…You can’t be serious.”

“They float if they get into the water and are closed toe.”

“I know you have more fashion sense than that.”

Illya shoved his rolled up socks and water bottle into his spandex and stood by the boat. “This is not a runway.” They both stood by the red shell and slipped it off the racks together and hefted it onto their shoulders. 

“These are practical,” Napoleon said referring to the slide on sandals he was wearing, but they don’t look like the devil took a hole puncher to grandpa’s shoes.”

“Are you always this vocal when you do not eat breakfast?” Illya sighed. He adjusted the shell slightly and the gunnel of the boat bit into Napoleon’s shoulder. 

“I can’t be associated with someone who wears crocs,” Napoleon replied and shifted the boat again, before taking lead and walking them down to the river. 

Down on the dock they went to the furthest point to give the eight boat behind them room and lifted the boat overhead before rolling the boat over and into the water. Napoleon stayed on the dock, opening the oar locks as Illya grabbed their oars. Tossing in his water bottle into the bow, he watched as Gaby commandeered the men with succinct commands, guarding the delicate skeg on the underside with one hand and holding to her cox box with the other as they put the boat into the water. 

“See you on the water,” she said as Illya walked back with the oars. 

“If you ever get out there,” Illya said. Napoleon took his oar and locked it in. 

“Novices,” she said and turned away to get her boat ready. 

Illya and Napoleon got into their boat, teetering slightly as they pushed off and were finally in the water. Sitting down and extending his oar, Napoleon took a stroke to clear them of the dock and together they rowed out to the far side of the river where Coach Waverly stood at the helm of the launch boat.

Cold still water and a warm morning sun. It was going to be a good day.

“I want you two to practice racing starts,” Waverly called out over to them. Napoleon watched Illya’s back as he got settled in, holing the oar in place with his thigh as he pulled on his socks and shoved his feet into the boat shoes. “Then we’re going to do some timed 2Ks.”

“Sounds fun,” Napoleon said as he slipped his feet into his shoes as well. 

And then they began to row. Sure, they started with the normal warm up of arms only, then half slide, and so on, but it was finally quiet on the water. The sun had finally burned away the mist, but the sunlight was warm against his skin and glittered like diamonds on the dark water below them. They rowed in silence, only broken while Napoleon called out the starting positions for their racing starts. 

It was rhythmic and wonderful. The power of the boat as they glided through the water left a clean line behind them. All he could hear was the timed movement of their slides and clatter of the oars. Illya sat in front of him and it always amazing to see his muscles ripple in the movement. He was the only one on the team who could beat his erg times, and there was a very clear and well sculpted reason for it in front of his eyes every day. 

They raced against themselves mostly, trying to beat their own time as there were no other pair boats on the water, and by the time practice was over, a pleasant ache had settled into his body. 

“Think we’re in good shape?” Napoleon asked as they rowed up to the dock. 

“We can do better,” Illya said as he undid his oar lock. 

“As long as we beat Thrush, I’ll be happy,” Napoleon said, referring to their school rival. 

Illya took their oars up back to the landing and they pulled the boat out of the water. When they got up to the boathouse, they rested the boat on slings to rinse it down and put away the oars. 

“Don’t you have an eight o’clock?” Napoleon said as he noticed Illya glancing at his watch. He tilted his head towards the road and said, “Go ahead, I can finish up here.”

“Thank you,” Illya said and grabbed his backpack, switched to his sneakers, and then ran off to class. 

Napoleon watched him with a frown and then turned to the boat. “Hey, April,” he called out to one of the sophomore women on the team, “want to help me put this away?”

When both of them had put the boat and the oars away, and Napoleon thanked her for her help, he waited for Gaby to finish talking to their coach as he leaned against the doorframe. She finished up and he held out her bag. “Ready for breakfast?” he asked. 

“Only if you pay,” she teased and stuffed her water bottle into her bag. 

“I happen to know the most exclusive spot in town,” he said and waived his student ID in front of her, “and it takes a card to get in.”

“Well then,” she said “what are we–“

“Solo, a word?” Coach Waverly called from the boathouse.

“Hold on a minute,” he muttered to Gaby and walked in. 

Waverly was marking up some notes on the clipboard and gave him a small smile. “How is Kuryakin doing? I didn’t get to talk to him before he ran off.”

“Sir?” Napoleon asked. 

“All I mean to say is he has been looking tired recently. A bit thin around the edges if you will.” He paused, assessing Napoleon in front of him and added, “If everything is alright, keep an eye on him, won’t you?”

“Sure,” he said in surprise. 

“Good. You two have been a great pair last season and this year so far. We’ll talk later about training for upcoming qualifiers, alight? Have a good day at classes, then.” He gave him another smile and then turned back to his notes. 

Napoleon walked back over to Gaby, squinting at the sunlight pouring through the trees. It was going to be a hot day. “Off to breakfast?”

“Lead the way,” she replied and they both took off in a jog.  


* * *

  
Later at the dining hall, Napoleon sat down in the chair by the window and neatly tucked into his omelette. Gaby, who had already been sitting there, took a sip of coffee and put down a copy of _Persuasion_. “What’s your next class?” she asked.

“11 o’clock, Art history,” he said quickly before downing a glass of chocolate milk. “You?”

“Choreography” She speared a piece of pineapple on her plate. “Illya’s at his class now, right?”

“Fluid dynamics, or something like that,” Napoleon confirmed. “He’s got that until 10 and then has Calc III until 11.”

“I don’t envy him,” she said. 

“No,” Napoleon agreed. He was a Linguistics and Art History major. Gaby was a Dance major and working on a Sports Medicine minor. Neither required as much math as Illya’s Mechanical Engineering major did. “Then he has that TA program with the Russian lit teacher from 1 to 2, and then I think he’s got something else after that.”

Gaby frowned. “No wonder he’s been so stressed.” She scooped up some yogurt into her spoon, pausing to point it at Napoleon. “Has he said anything to you?”

“No,” he answered and took another bite of his omelette. “Why do you say he’s stressed?”

She gave glanced at him from under her full eyelashes, taking a long sip of her coffee as she clearly thought over her words. Napoleon grabbed his glass of water, drinking it with a lifted eyebrow as he stared back at her. “You’re his roommate. You really can’t tell?”

“We’ve only been roommates for a few months.”

“You’ve known him for over a year.”

“Half of that I wanted to strangle him,” he reminded her.  
Gaby hummed and rested her chin on her palm, swirling fruit into the yogurt. “At least he smiles more around you,”

Napoleon snorted, “I’m sure he does.” Some days he wasn’t sure how their friendship had been forged. “What ever happened with you two over the summer anyway,” he asked. 

“Us?” She asked with a frown. “Nothing, we texted a few times, but that was really it. Same as you.”

Well, there had been some phone calls in his case, but really, “So nothing happened after you kissed?”

Her frown deepened. “We never kissed.” There was a flash of something, an illumination in her eyes as she sighed and said, “Did you think we were dating?”

Wasn’t that obvious? Napoleon busied his hands by grabbing the pepper shaker on the table and tilted it onto it’s edge, nearly about to topple over. “I thought something was going on,” he said as he toyed with the shaker. He knew from being Illya’s roommate that he wasn’t dating (that would leave far more obvious clues) but there had been something last year. He’d have to be blind to not see that. 

Gaby leaned back in her chair. “I’ll admit, I had something like a crush for him,” she held up a hand when Napoleon opened his mouth, “but that went away quickly.” She snatched the pepper from him, and put it back to her side of the table. “Besides, he’s already had his eyes on someone else.”

Huh. Well, good for Illya then, he supposed. He barely had time for anything what with school and practice and his job. There was a small burn in his stomach, an ember of – well, not quite anger– but something that he found this out from Gaby and not Illya himself. Napoleon’s fork clattered against the plate as he speared his last bite of breakfast. “Don’t tell me it’s Cila,” he said, referring to the senior on the women’s team. At 6’2’’ she was certainly able to rival their friend’s handsome frame. They did tend to hang around each other during erg practice. 

Gaby shook her head and put her fork down. Taking out her phone, she began typing something and grabbed her plate and stacked her cup on top. “I don’t have time for this,” she said as she slid out of her seat. 

“What?” 

Gaby paused to tap him lightly on the head with her phone as she stood by his seat. “I’ll see you at dinner, idiot.”

“Is it Sarah?” he called to her back as she walked away. In return all he got was a wave of her hand. 

Fine. Off to class then.

* * *

Napoleon lay on his bed, returned to his dorm after his art history class. He’d have to head out again soon to go to his Morphology class, but he could afford to lounge a little. He’d have to meet up with Gaby and Illya for drylands after class and then for dinner, but for now he had Netflix. 

His computer was balanced on his stomach and head pillowed on on arm when the door scratched with the telltale sound of a key and Illya came through. Napoleon glanced at the time on his phone. “Class canceled?”

“No, just got to leave early.” He settled his backpack on his side of the room, settling into his desk chair and powering up his laptop. “Netflix?” he asked. 

“Yep.” Napoleon hit the spacebar to pause the show and added, “ I did finish my essays though, before you say anything.”

“I do not doubt you.” Illya pulled out a notebook and added, “you may play stupid sometimes, but I know you’re not.”

“I don’t play stupid,” Napoleon said. 

“Then maybe you are just stupid.”

“That’s worse. You’re terrible. You are perilous to my health”

“Just your ego,” Illya replied. Napoleon flipped him off, even though Illya wasn’t looking at him. Sometimes it was just the principle that counted. He settled back in to continue on with the show when he felt his phone buzz against his thigh. He was never going to finish the season at this point.

He glanced at the message and said, “Gaby’s going to be late to dinner.”

“What time?” Illya asked, still reviewing his notes. 

“She thinks 7:30, 8.” 

“That’s fine.” Napoleon texted her back that they were still on for dinner and put his phone back into his pocket. “We should go to the gym then.”

“You can’t be serious,” Napoleon said looking down at him from his lofted bed. “We had practice this morning, we have erging at 5 and then you want to go to the gym?”

“Are you telling me you can’t handle it?”

“You don’t think I know this is a plot against me?” Napoleon said. 

“Ah yes, how nefarious. Getting you to work out and be tired.”

“You just want me to shut up.” Napoleon accused and put his show back on. 

“True.” Illya was smiling as he opened a textbook open, “And somehow you are still not the worst roommate I have had.”

“Why are we friends?”

“You think I have an answer for that?” 

They fell into comfortable silence, with Napoleon using the subtitles to not distract Illya and eventually it was time for him to leave for his own class. “See you after Morphology,” Illya said as Napoleon grabbed his bag. 

“See you at Erg practice,” he said and closed the door behind him. He still wasn’t sure how they had ended up as friends, but Napoleon was glad they had. 

* * *

Erg practice that evening had been something developed from the inner circle of hell and Waverly was it’s grand master. “I’m going to throw up if you tell me we have to do another 10K test this week.” 

Steve, one of the coxswains, looked up grimly from his clipboard where he had been recording Napoleon’s time. “You don’t want me to answer that.”

“Damn.” Napoleon said still breathing heavily and turned to look at Illya. “You really want to go to the gym after this?”

Even he looked tired. Illya guzzled down water as he glanced at the readout on Napoleon’s erg. Wiping his mouth and still panting, Illya said, “I think we should. You didn’t improve on your time.”

“I didn’t exactly go up either,” Napoleon muttered and drank from his water bottle. As usual, Illya still had a better time than him. But not by too much. Illya was almost always first. “Any why do you know my 10k time off the top of your head?”

“It’s important to know you are improving,” he said. He got off the erg, stretching his arms and back and Napoleon watched his shirt ride up with the movement. 

Napoleon got off his seat and rubbed at his palms where the handle had rubbed against his skin. He was definitely going to get blisters at this rate. Ah well, calloused hands were the least of his problems. His roommate trying to kill him through training was more pressing. “We are not running,” he said and moved around Steve where he recorded the time of one of the other men. 

“We should jog, as a warm down.”

“You can run, and I’ll see you there,” Napoleon said and pushed Illya a little as he passed him. Leaving the erg room, he zipped up his light jacket and went to the water fountain down the hall to refill his bottle. “See you outside,” he called to Illya. 

He ran into Coach Waverly by the fountain. “Solo,” he greated. Napoleon nodded and began to fill his bottle. 

“Hey, Coach Waverly,” he said before his coach could walk away. When Waverly paused he turned to him, still filling the bottle. “Why’d you ask me to watch out for Illya. I mean, I will, but why?”

“Oh, well you two seem particularly close.”

“Uh.”

“Did I misread that?” Waverly paused when Napoleon offered no answer and said, “I know you two are dorm roommates, that’s all I meant. Illya has shown a tendency to overwork himself, and I’d rather not see him get injured.” 

“Right.” 

“See you at practice tomorrow, Solo.” Waverly said and walked back into the erg room. Napoleon closed the lid on his water bottle and trudged out to where Illya was stretching by the bottom of the steps. 

“Ready?” he asked. 

“Yeah,” Napoleon said and sighed as Illya began to jog and resignedly started chasing after him into dark night.

**Author's Note:**

> Rowing Glossary: 
> 
> Catch a Crab: A rowing term to describe when the oar blade gets caught in the water and may result in the oar becoming parallel to the boat. All rowers at some point will catch a crab, and a severe one can eject the rower from their boat. 
> 
> Coxswain: The person who is in charge of the navigation of the boat. 
> 
> Oar Lock: Swivel U shape lock that holds the oar in place.
> 
> Erg: A device designed by Satan. An indoor rowing machine used to simulate the movements of rowing for training purposes. 
> 
> Backsplash: When the water comes from the back of the blade at the catch.


End file.
